


Dreaming Revelations

by ilyena_sylph, Merfilly



Series: For Family [9]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Thrawn Trilogy - Timothy Zahn, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Complicated Relationships, F/M, Vader is a jealous creature, but he's trying so hard to be better
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-08
Updated: 2016-07-08
Packaged: 2018-07-22 09:11:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7428743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilyena_sylph/pseuds/ilyena_sylph, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leia's dreams disturb Vader as they are tainted by the Force.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dreaming Revelations

Their lives settled to a routine for a time from there. Darth Vader made the time to get his suit repaired, under Ahsoka's guarding, and then handled the continuing clean-up of the Fleet and the Army. His lack of mercy with those who resisted the new ways made the New Republic uncomfortable, but the division of power at this time was such that the Empire's military resources were more directly in his keeping. 

Vader was still growing accustomed to the splash of the Force coming to him from others. Palpatine had been guarded, unless he was specifically being overbearing. Now, though, Ahsoka's wild touches in the Force were a reassurance of the fact he was finding himself. The younger woman had never truly cared to mask herself… and only did so now when she was guarding her privacy. Something at the Alderaanian embassy, for instance, kept her in a more private, shielded place.

More than her splash, though, Vader had come to actively treasure those brief flares that were Leia slipping past the inhibitions on her Force ability. How Bail, or Breha, had managed to inhibit her would be food for thought some day, though Ahsoka believed it to be a natural evolution of self-control in the environment she'd been raised in.

This night, though, the splash that hit Vader was neither pleasant nor welcome, and he was on the move from his outer walkway in the next heartbeat. His daughter was broadcasting confusion, curiosity, and wariness all in one. While Ahsoka would probably beat him there, he had no desire to be kept from learning what had pushed her so far.

Ahsoka was present, but not at Leia's door when Vader strode in. She looked at him, then down the hallway. "She's sleeping, _ori'vod_ ," she said, even as it was clear she was only working on a tracker to keep from going in herself.

"Then it is even more imperative I know what is wrong," he said in a harsh voice, sweeping past so that he could go to the bedroom. Only at the door did he hesitate; it was not his place to be the one to intrude, and yet, she was experiencing the Force during her sleep. That had never boded well for _him_.

His hand pressed the door control, and he stepped in as quietly as he could, before calling her name. "Leia?"

Something suddenly didn't belong, not here in this endless sprawl of solid, flat near-white and heat, the gleam of two suns beating down, the sound of wind and sand and the slow growling hiss of machinery. Leia was standing beside a boy, all sun-bleached hair and pale reflective clothes, her attention as fixed on the machine in front of them as his was, but... something didn't belong. Something had -- 

'Leia'. 

Something had called her name, something was different around her, something echoed in her ears, almost a hiss -- 

She snapped awake, her hand reaching for the light, struggling to come fully conscious and utterly confused as to why her biological father was standing in her bedroom. It was _so dark_.. "Yes? I... hello?" 

Vader came closer, hearing her move, seeing the reach, and his Force reached out to turn the light on dimly for her. "I felt you falling into the Force, Leia. That can be dangerous, especially in a dream."

Leia blinked against the light, but it was helpful, and moved so that she could sit up -- she was not lying down and letting two meters of suit loom over her. She also slid sideways, making room on the bed for him to take a seat (strange, she was making room for Darth Vader to sit down on her bed) so that he would loom even less, as she tried to gather her thoughts. 

This whole idea that she had the Force, that mythical power of the Jedi, was something incredible and almost unbelievable, but she... "I was... somewhere else," she said, trying to catch hold of that dream again, what she'd seen... 

He had sat as invited, and on her words, he put a hand on her shoulder in worry for her. He hated the dreams he remembered, as they had always been tinged by the Force trying to shove his 'destiny' around. 

"Tell me what you see in the dream."

He sounded... concerned, inside that electronic voice, and what she could see of his body language matched. The hand on her shoulder was light, not tight, and it... she could almost feel that her read was right and he _was_ concerned. She made a moment's noise, considering. "White," she answered, "white sand, an almost white sky.... a binary system, two suns, not far apart, heat..." 

That was what a choked noise through his voder sounded like then, an idle part of his mind thought as his brain immediately reacted to her description. Why would she be seeing _that planet_? It could be some other desert world, but…

"One slightly larger, red-orange when it nears the horizon, the other brighter, more yellow?" Vader asked.

"It was full day," Leia answered, before she said "this time," and only knew then that yes, she had had this dream before, over and over again before, "but... yes. Yes, that's what the suns look like when they start to set, and the sands turn gold, and orange, and red to russet before they go purple..." 

Vader's breathing only continued because it was programmed to, as her words confirmed his fear. "Tatooine, in the Outer Rim," he told her, his hand on her shoulder having flexed once before he could control the motion consciously.

She felt the ache of a too-tight grip, but he released, and she knew, somehow, that he had not meant to at all. "Tatooine," she murmured, nodding slightly. "I haven't had one of those dreams since I was just a little girl... why would it come back now?" 

"Since you were young?" His voice changed to a charged, expectant one. "I have not gone near Tatooine since… a very long time ago, well before you were born," he mused. "Yet… to dream of it at all, when you never even knew I was part of your heritage…" He turned that impassive mask to make it clear he was looking directly at her. "Do you see anything else, Leia? It is likely this is a Force Vision, and we must be warned of any danger in it."

"The boy," Leia answered, instant, letting her eyes half-close, thinking, looking for those old, old memories. She wasn't Winter, for that to be easy... but he was -- he sounded almost afraid. "He was little then, just like me, and always getting into things. My 'imaginary friend', everyone said... but now he's my age. He was working on... something. Tall and thin, metal. I think I knew what it was while I was asleep, but I don't now." 

Vader looked and found her data pad and stylus, turning it on. It did not take him but a few lines and moments to sketch on it, turning to show the finished product to her. "Vaporator?" he asked, naming the device. A boy, her age, on Tatooine? Why did he have the urge to commit murder again… no, he knew. This was all adding up to something that had Kenobi's vile hand on it.

Leia blinked at the quick, precise sketch, and it swam to life in front of her eyes, gleaming bleached silver-white and humming, and she nodded. "Yes, that's it exactly... well, almost exactly, there was a different shape here?" she tapped at one side, "but other than that, yes, this is what he was working on. 

"But I've never seen one before. Or seen that world. What... is going on with me?" 

"For that, we would have to ask your father, I believe," he said in a low rumble, one that held danger… but not at Bail. "To see if he even knows. The treacherous Jedi could have stolen his memory, if I am correct." He shook his helm slowly. "Tatooine, Leia, is where I was a slave. It is where my mother died… after I had suffered from Force Visions that told me I needed to go to her, and my… Jedi Master refused to hear me out! Your mother did listen, supported me going, but… it was too late.

"I believe you are seeing visions of a twin, one you are connected to through the Force, and I have such anger that Kenobi would have forced a child of mine to such a hard life!"

She was seeing the planet where he had been a slave? Leia felt a little faint at that, and then he kept talking, pain and rage filling his electronic voice, and she shifted closer, laying one of her hands on one broad thigh, the armor-weave under her fingers oddly warm. She had somehow expected it to be cold. 

"I'm sorry for your loss, and for that someone was so stupid," she told him, looking into those blank lenses, wishing she could see _him_ and not just the mask, even as she thought about the idea of a twin. A sibling, a brother, a... "I don't know that name, 'Kenobi', was -- is he -- the Jedi you're so angry with?" 

"Yes." He was so surprised at her willingness to offer comfort to him… and it helped cool his rage. "He was the last person I knew to be with your mother, in the last encounter I had with her. He would have saved her… but the Jedi were notorious for stealing children from their families for their own purposes."

"Father said that she died just after she gave birth to me," Leia said, her fingers still resting on his leg, listening and -- wait, _what?_! 

It took a moment before she realized that she'd actually snapped that aloud, her spine going stiff and her eyes snapping as she stared at him. Definitely something to ask Ahsoka about, too, but... he sounded so certain, and so angry. 

If he could have smiled for her, it would have been cold and menacing in response to his memories. "At nine, I was too old. Most were brought to the Temple before their first year, given up by parents brainwashed to believe it was an honor. Those few, like myself, or even Ahsoka who was asked at an age when she could reason, but not know the fullness of her choice, that came late, questioned too much.

"Babies in the Republic were tested regularly, and sent in hopes they would be taught. But Jedi always listened for those not tested, and found ways to make them come to the Temple."

She shook her head, trying to match that to the respect she had heard in her father's voice about the Jedi, the agony in Bail's voice about _this man_ slaughtering children in a Temple, 'brought to the Temple', and felt the cold menace of his rage boiling around her, through the room, out... "But why?" 

Vader considered that question, not to calculate the best answer, but to try and make sense of it as he understood truth. "How else do you build a closed, rigid, unchanging society that thinks it is normal and acceptable to make the emotional needs of sentient species into unwanted detriments?"

Leia shook her head, feeling herself go pale, staring at him. "...but _why_ would anyone do that, or want to do that? Father speaks of the Jedi with such respect, and he is one of the most loving, compassionate men I have ever met... and closed societies decay into corruption, that's been seen thousands of times, it's one of the problems I've had with the Empire since I was old enough to reason..." 

Oh so gently, he drew his fingers to her face, a light stroke of affection and pride in her questioning before he withdrew it. "The Republic only saw their guardians, their negotiators, and knew nothing of the truth of the Jedi within. Nor, in many cases, would they have cared, for if there were no Jedi, there would be no one to enforce peace and stability throughout their reach.

"Likely, your father could not know that the 'honor' of turning children over to the Temple was stealing basic rights from sentients, because it was a cultural norm," he finished. "Always question such practices, Leia… and you will be as strong a fighter for freedom as you can be."

The armored fingers brushing down her cheek were cool, but not cold, and the pride in her slid over her... as gently as the rage had boiled painfully. That was another thing that was incredibly strange, this new ability to actually sense, erratically and strangely, what was going on within another's heart. Strange, and often frightening, especially with this man, but... at this moment, it was oddly pleasing. 

That was probably something she should be wary of, in the long term, even if he was... changing. "That," she said about those last words, "I'm pretty certain I can manage. 

"And I'm not going to start an argument over the Empire's track record on the rights of sentients, since you've had... quite a bit to say about changing those policies since the restoration of the Senate." 

"Sometimes, even I can learn the errors of my ways," he told her, frankly amused by her. "Now, back to the issue with your possible brother… when will the Senate be on hiatus again?" He had tasks to get done, and wished to do so before meeting the boy.

"That's good to hear," she answered, hoped it was true, and thought about his question for a moment, two, then came up with the answer. "There's a four day break in two ten-days, but the next 'everyone return home' hiatus isn't for another two standard months... and it is a full month." 

Could he bear to wait so long as that? It might very well take that long to manage the suit change he was planning. "Do you sense any threat in your dreams, for the boy?" he asked. "I prefer you be with me, when I go, to find him. He deserves to live better than that hellish planet can provide him."

Leia thought, sinking back into the fading wisps of the dream, and shook her head after a few moments. "No... he was just bored, and hot. A little tired, maybe, but...it didn't seem like he was in any danger." 

"Would you be willing to travel with me, then, when the long hiatus comes?" he invited her. "There are items I have been putting off that I need to accomplish before then. You would have the Tower between now and then, or if you prefer -- and Ahsoka can find a security chief she trusts -- you could return to the Alderaan embassy, with Vorkhiron and his clan mates," he added, extending that level of trust to her. It was beyond time to begin establishing such matters, if he was to have any luck in convincing her to accept his teachings in the Force, after all.

"Of course I want to go with you," Leia replied immediately, shaking her head at him for the fact that he thought he'd had to ask. "If you're right, this is my brother you're talking about. 

"And as to where I'll stay while the Senate is still in session... I think I would like to return to the Embassy at least part of the time. I'm reachable here, of course, but there are things I should be dealing with personally and not by comms. 

"Yet it is quiet here..." 

"Then I will speak to Ahsoka about security there," Vader told her. "As I will need her at my side for this extended absence." It pleased him that he had managed to make the Tower feel like a refuge for her. He didn't even feel anger any longer, to refer to Bail as her father; Organa had proven his worth and gave Leia what a father should, what Vader could not have ever given.

It left Vader, as he shook free of the hatred that had consumed him, able to find a new place in her life. It would hopefully lead to being her teacher, and he could already anticipate, warmly, the limitations Ahsoka would try to impose there.

Traveling to take care of his suit modifications would help there, too, Vader knew. Ahsoka was unaccustomed to being in one place for long, and it had been some months since he'd brought her to Coruscant. One trip to the _Exactor_ , in which the Fist had learned not to cross her, had done little for her restless spirit.

She'd bonded, though, with the aging clone sergeant, and Vader had felt a flash of jealousy, as the Mando'a had flowed freely between the pair. Ahsoka, _his_ padawan, had a better rapport with the original troopers than he'd ever managed.

He' been so consumed by his love for Padmé that he'd never really given her enough of his time, so was it any wonder that she'd thrown herself into their culture and brotherhood?

++++

At Vader's demand that she make certain the Alderaan embassy was secure enough for Leia and Winter, Ahsoka had carefully given him a serious nod, and demanded in turn that he see to Leia's safety that entire day.

If Ahsoka was going to be off planet for an extended period of time, she was going to see her husband, safely tucked away inside the Embassy by Bail, and very much her only secret from her _Ori'vod_. 

Rex's pleasure at learning he had her company for an entire day, even if they would do an inspection of security measures first, was only tempered by knowing she would be gone. He half-wanted to go with her, admit his survival to his former general, help her keep him anchored in the gray, even if he would not come fully to the Light.

"Shh, _riduur_ ," Ahsoka fussed at him, twining her fingers with his. "In time, yes, he needs to know his friend. But he still grows cold and pushes me away, sometimes, when he is feeling too many emotions."

Rex stroked his free hand along her cheek, thumb tracing the pattern there. "As you wish it, _cyar'ika_ ," he murmured, glad to know he had the time to wait. When Ahsoka had first found him, before she went to Malachor, her shock at his aging had led to a very interesting night, and Rex had learned what it felt like to have the Force pour through his body in an unrestrained healing that had undone the accelerated aging. He hadn't known that was what it was, only worried as Ahsoka had passed out unconscious on his chest.

He hadn't aged much since that night, though, and his body remained strong enough to meet her demands, now that they had been reunited.

"Do what you can to convince Artooey to cough up his memories while I'm gone?" Ahsoka said, smiling. The astromech was playing dumb with her, not trusting her because she was too often in Vader's personal space, protecting him and aiding his search for those who meant true harm to the New Republic. The little mech was not certain she was still one to trust.

"I'll do what I can, Ahsoka," he promised, before guiding her on the tour a little faster, a tour that would end in his room with them both not to be disturbed.

++++

Vader could not help but notice how vitalized Ahsoka felt as they went to his fighter, to begin the trip up to the _Exactor_. He studied her, keeping his focus indirect, so that he could take his time to see all the ways she stood out inside the Force. With her piloting for them, it was easier, as Coruscant traffic was slowly increasing toward normal levels.

The Togruta had matured into a tall, athletic specimen of her race. She was rarely out of the armor and sensor plates for her arms and legs, with the breastplate to protect her chest from blaster fire. Inside the Force, she was a blaze of bright energy, flickers of life and passion that reached out to him, promising loyalty unlike any other.

She still fought with him, a treasure as much as her willingness to be near to him. In the months since they had killed the Emperor together, she had yelled at him, cried for him, and cared for him in ways that made it so much easier to break away from hate and anger.

Only once had she pushed him far enough that he'd wrapped the Force around her throat… and she had attacked him with both 'sabers, with the little air she knew she had left, rather than let that crushing pressure paralyze her. He'd let go, she'd dropped to her knees, and her eyes had focused on his mask with a silent promise to kill him if he ever lost himself again.

"You're staring," she finally said as they climbed above most atmospheric traffic.

He did not answer, his sensor-assisted vision sweeping over her exposed skin, coming back to the lekku and shoulders, noticing now that there were faint discolorations along the patterning. Small bruises? For them to be on her lekku…

"You have a lover. That is why you shield when you are at the embassy." He said it calmly, even as he turned it over in his heart. She was _his_ , in ways that did not extend to sexuality, but were intimate in other ways. He had let her sleep against his side, head on his thigh, petted her montrals… and now he knew someone else had the right to stroke her lekku and have a piece of her that he did not.

Nor did he want it; the familial bond of teacher and student, brother and sister to be more accurate, was what he craved with her. It was more that someone else had a piece of her at all that sparked the slight jealousy, while he resented not knowing everything. If she could keep one secret….

"... _now_ you get perceptive?" Ahsoka complained, rather than even attempt to deny it or hide from him -- that would only make things worse, damage the still sometimes-fragile peace and rapport they were settling back into, "seriously?" 

"You have bruises," he pointed out. "And while your skin is dark enough to hide them from normal eyes, the heat patterns stand out to me." She was not trying to hide the truth, and that eased something. This was not a secret of danger, but one of just not telling. "Is this being worth your time, or merely useful to you?" he asked, forcing himself to acknowledge this piece of Ahsoka that was not his, that he did not wish to possess… even as he worried it might cut her away from him. It had been his own preoccupation with Padmé, after all, that had allowed her to run wild and learn Mando'a so fluently, and the culture of the clones.

She had started to grumble at him for seeing the heat patterns of her bruises -- and then he asked that last, and she growled at him, her fingers flexing, even as the feeling of his uncertain worry (uncertainty? her _ori'vod_?) concerned her. Why was he -- oh. **Oh**. He was worrying he might lose her again. 

"He's very worth my time," she said, making herself pull away from the insult to her husband, her mate, and accept his overbearing variety of concern. Okay. Once they were in hyperspace, once they were headed for their destination and he would not appear weak in front of the Fleet by reversing their course, she would tell him. She hadn't wanted to, not yet, but... it would do far, far more damage than good not to. "And I'm a big girl that doesn't need an overbearing older brother looming at my lover." 

Vader's presence shifted to amusement for her way of addressing his concerns, as well as half a beat of surprise. "Male… that is surprising. Given your … fascination with Riyo Chuchi at one time," he said, showing he had paid attention to that friendship. 

"...I didn't think you'd really noticed," she said, startled, even as she swatted lightly at him, not even connecting, for the teasing comment. There, now he was amused, that was much, much better. Much safer, too. "And yes, I liked her a lot, but what does that have to do with anything?" 

"Some people only like one. You were as rough and tumble as the men; maybe you imprinted on liking women." He then considered that. "Except I know for a fact many of the men were hard-wired to only accept their brothers." 

The _Exactor_ was beginning to fill the viewport, having a decent position among the various vessels, Fleet and private, that hung in Coruscant's orbit. Vader could not help but rake his eyes possessively over the ship; he missed being in space aboard her, even as he knew Leia was more than enough reason to stay planet-side.

He'd missed so much time with her mother, fighting a war that never should have been. He would not abandon the daughter he'd never known, as she lived up to Padmé's legacy.

"Mm-hmm," Ahsoka agreed, "some of them were. And no. I'm not that limited. Picky and selective, yes, but I don't really care what bits someone's got under their clothes if I like their heart. ...and that really is a beautiful ship, even if she's ridiculously huge." 

"Ridiculously huge?" Vader gave her a reproachful 'look' she could feel in the Force. "She's not meant to be a maneuverable atmospheric ship. She's a battle platform for the TIEs, a way of keeping a full army safe against reprisals and ambushes.

"She's also much smaller than the new line of Star Destroyers," he added, just to see if she squawked. "I do not know if the entire line will be built, but the _Executor_ that was to be my flagship was mostly framed."

"Smaller?! _Smaller?!_ " Ahsoka twisted around to stare at him, shaking her head. What did anyone need with a ship bigger than the one expanding in front of them! "Men and their big guns, I _swear_. And of course she's a capital ship, I haven't forgotten everything you taught me, I promise. I never managed to get my hands on an Imperial TIE; what're they like to fly?" 

Vader began to say it aloud, and then just flooded their training… not training, not anymore… their personal bond with the freedom he felt in his TIE, the way the small ship became an extension of his will, the sleek power and speed, with the vulnerability of having to rely on skill, not shields, to stay alive in one. 

"Perfect," he said once he'd given her that impression. 

"Oh... I'd say," Ahsoka breathed, leaning into the bond, riding the feeling with him. He'd always felt freest in a fighter, that was when he stopped being entirely the General and was himself... "I've _got_ to try that." 

"We'll make time for it, then _ner'vod_ ," he promised her, before turning to handle the communication with the _Exactor_ 's bridge crew. 


End file.
